Where is the Unearthed Arcana SRD?

[wingsandsword]

IIRC, one of the authors of the book posted here and requested people to not make any of the book accessible for free, hence it did not occur.

Now I'm confused with, why make it OGC if they don't want it being handed around for free? I can understand this objection with WotC's closed-content books, but for the open content plethora that is UA isn't it contradictory to say "It's open content, but please don't distribute it for free."

Honestly, how does it "undermine" the OGL? Cergorach had a good thing going, and was even willing to wait 6 months to not undercut new book sales (since IIRC the vast majority of sales of a book come in that time). Why release it as OGC if you don't want people doing that? I can understand why WotC wouldn't do it themselves, since it's time and thus money spent on something that earns them no money, but I don't get the discouraging fans to do it, although it seems perfectly legal (admittedly IANAL).

Is it not perfectly legal to retype one of the many OGC sections and redistribute it with the OGL? Just like you would OGC from any other OGL/d20 product.

Personally, I just find it a pain to retype all the house rules I'm using by hand for handouts to my players, since they aren't going to go buy a $30 book just to know what their Class Defense Bonus table is and how Action points work, so that book gets a lot of milage at my table. I would use that document (either official or fan-produced) just like I would any other SRD, as something to cut 'n paste when coming up with rules handouts for my players.

 

[Nifelhein]

I doubt tere will be any and I also disagree with it undermining the OGL, specially because UA rules seem to need loads of work to fit any D&D world or game out there, I own a copy, got it at 605 off from amazon and have seen the book before buying, I am even going to use the WP/VP system in my games along with a few others!

But I don't think it works as it is and have already made a more coherent and fiting version for WP/VP and am going to be working on the Action Points, Defense and Armor as Damage reduction sometime in the near future, I hope.

 

[Pbartender]

Now I'm confused with, why make it OGC if they don't want it being handed around for free? I can understand this objection with WotC's closed-content books, but for the open content plethora that is UA isn't it contradictory to say "It's open content, but please don't distribute it for free."

Honestly, how does it "undermine" the OGL? Cergorach had a good thing going, and was even willing to wait 6 months to not undercut new book sales (since IIRC the vast majority of sales of a book come in that time). Why release it as OGC if you don't want people doing that? I can understand why WotC wouldn't do it themselves, since it's time and thus money spent on something that earns them no money, but I don't get the discouraging fans to do it, although it seems perfectly legal (admittedly IANAL).

Earning them no money is a pretty big deal, when you think about it. I mean, really, who wants to work for free?

Regardless of want you'll use it for, there are certainly others who'll use it to get the rules without paying for the book. That could feasibly make for a pretty big hit in profits... And game designers have to pay bills too.

Remember, the purpose of the OGL is not to provide free rules to the players, but to give third party publishers the ability to produce material using the same set of basic rules.

Is it not perfectly legal to retype one of the many OGC sections and redistribute it with the OGL? Just like you would OGC from any other OGL/d20 product.

Yes it is perfectly legal, but as Chris Pramas put it when I suggested a Skull & Bones SRD...

"What you suggest is a legal use of the OGL, so we couldn't stop you from doing such a thing (though you couldn't use the S&B Trademark without our permission). However, we would prefer if you didn't give away 90% of the content of one of our books on the interenet. Thanks."

In the end, I didn't do it, because I didn't want to take away the bread & butter of one of my favorite RPG publishers.

 

[philreed]

Now I'm confused with, why make it OGC if they don't want it being handed around for free? I can understand this objection with WotC's closed-content books, but for the open content plethora that is UA isn't it contradictory to say "It's open content, but please don't distribute it for free."

Because the point of the OGL -- and by association, OGC -- isn't to provide the world with free rules and books. The point of the OGL is to provide publishers with tools that they can reuse, rewrite, or otherwise adapt to their own products.

Just about everything I have published has been 100% OGC. While that means it would be legal for someone to strip the text out of my PDFs and post them online, it doesn't mean that I'd be happy about it. Such action would, I guarantee, affect the amount of OGC I release in the future.

And this is likely true with WotC as well.

If the Unearthed Arcana material is used as it was intended -- by publishers -- we could possibly see more OGL releases from WotC. If the Unearthed Arcana is posted for free online, the chance of future OGC releases from WotC will likely drop to zero.

 

[philreed]

In the end, I didn't do it, because I didn't want to take away the bread & butter of one of my favorite RPG publishers.

Thank you. That's a demonstration of understanding the situation perfectly. While it had no direct effect on me, I appreciate what you did.

 

[Verequus]

Yes, I meant the access to the OGC without buying the book. From what I've read so far, I wouldn't use at least 75% of the content, mainly because I have other rules like EoMR, which tackle a lot of problems, I have with the rules set. This means for me the waste of too much money, which I could invest in other books otherwise better. So I'll have to ask a friend, if he wants to buy it - he could like the book more than me.

Another note, I am male. ;-)

 

[BSF]

Don't take this the wrong way but ... do it yourself.

I mean, you don't expect third-party d20 publishers to be obliged to release SRD of their products, do you? Other than declaring what is OGC and what is not, there's nothing in either license that state you must provide SRD. Unearthed Arcana fulfilled the terms of the OGL. It even has the OGL attached to the product.

I already do it myself. It would just be easier if I could copy/paste it.

I own the core rulebooks and I bought CMG's SRD. I use both.

When I can, I copy/paste from PDFs for OGC. When it is content I want my players to have access to, but it isn't OGC, I print it. I don't let my copy leave my house. They can read it here, or they can buy it.

For OGC material I want to use that is only available in a print format, I can choose to only use it in print, or I can type it myself. Obviously, it would be easier if I had a digital copy to work from.

Do I expect it? No. Do I appreciate it when it is available? Well, at the moment I am buying more PDF products than I am print products in the D20 world. Great ideas, great accessibility, great prices. If there is a little rule I want to use, I can often quickly select it from the PDF, copy/paste and then make it easily available for my players to be aware of. It sure would have been nice to do that with the Unearthed Arcana Sanity rules when I implemented them.

 

[Savage Jim]

There was discussion of such an effort, but no one seemed to be interested in an organized effort.

I offered (under a previous screen name which is no longer functional) to host any excerpts that posters made for their own use (i.e., if you transcribed a section for your campaign, I would take that excerpt and compile it with others), but got no such transcriptions.

One poster (can't remember who) indicated that they were going to scan/OCR it and then strip out the non-OGC, which took the wind out of everyone's sail since this chap could do the job in 1/8th the time. Not sure if it ever happened though.

Consequently, I'm still willing to host/compile these excerpts once I have my new website up and running (hint hint wink wink).

 

[Voadam]

I don't think it is accurate to say the only purpose of WotC's srd is to allow 3rd party publishers to use the rules to create products. I believe I remember reading that the whole WotC strategy is to sell core books.

Having players and DMs have access to the rules free online is a boon to playing the game. Having the srd free online means it is easier to play the game. Easier to play leads to more people playing or playing more frequently which leads to more use from buying core rule books and supplemental rpg materials.

Even if players can play the game with just the srd and never buy a book, this is a boon for WotC as the pool of players increases and those who do buy books have more of a reason to do so and to continue to do so because they are more likely to be able to find a group to play with.

I think it is natural for 3rd party publishers to view the OGL as having a purpose of letting them publish D&D material legally and it makes economic sense for WotC to have created it for that purpose as WotC benefits from their support products. But I think it is a mistake to view the OGL as having that as its sole purpose.

 

[DaveStebbins]

Regardless of want you'll use it for, there are certainly others who'll use it to get the rules without paying for the book.

If the 60% off sale at Amazon didn't entice these people to buy the book, chances are they never would have paid for it anyway. Thus, I don't think it should be considered a lost sale.